Greg Veis, YouTube Hunter: From the Annals of Dumb Criminalia

BY

January 23, 2007

Along with playing chess and watching my friends have sex, I derive endless enjoyment from Dumb Criminal videos. And based upon all the airtime these grainy surveillance tapes get, I'm guessing you do, too. So let's drop the ado...

This one is the most famous of the stupid crook YouTubes. There are many different versions of this video including one that's more than borderline racist

--but I like this one the best for its subtitles, which are undoubtedly accurate:

And look at this guy who doesn't know the difference between pushing and pulling. Oh sweet petunia stank, this is awesome!

Here's another suspect the police didn't have trouble finding, and for added enjoyment the narrator of this piece is Trace Gallagher, my favorite of the Fox News anchors because a) that can't be his real name, and b) he bears an uncanny resemblance to Kent Brockman

This doesn't fit the strict definition of a dumb criminal video, but it's nicely weird:

Anyway, if you know of any other excellent such vids, post 'em in the comments section. And before you go, on a semi-related note, let me leave you with one of the best videos to get put on near constant rotation on The Box in the late 90s:

While it's better known for dead parrots and crossdressing lumberjacks, Monty Python has a surprisingly academic background. Five of the six members of the group (Graham Chapman, Michael Palin, Terry Jones, John Cleese, and Eric Idle) attended either Oxford or Cambridge. Cutting their teeth writing for other BBC series, the five eventually joined up, along with American Terry Gilliam, to create Monty Python's Flying Circus. While experimenting with the bounds of sketch comedy, the group also flexed their academic muscle throughout the course of the show, making reference to many works of classic literature in the process. Here's a compendium of many of these references, excluding the ones I couldn't find on YouTube.

The Semaphore Version of Wuthering Heights

What Episode: 15Authors/Works Referenced:Wuthering Heights, Emily BrontÃ« & Julius Caesar, William ShakespeareDon't Miss: The extent of the semaphore, from Catherine and Heathcliff to the baby, nurse, and old man.

People oftentimes assume Tracy Morgan is drunk or stoned to the bejesus. This is absurd to me, and cruel, too. In insinuating this, these people (let's call them "straw men") devalue a comedian who over the last several years--but particularly since he's literally (both on and off camera) morphed into his character Tracy Jordan from 30 Rock--has become something of a national treasure. Susan B. Anthony is a national treasure. Would you like to cast aspersions on her, too? Honestly. Think about it.

Not to say that Tracy's never gotten down. He's developed quite a Page Six rap sheet, as well as a realone. He was also in How High. But what he's done in the last few years has been ingenious: he's completely erased the barrier between his real self and his comedic persona. The act never stops. This is different than when you talk about certain people, comedians especially, who are always "on." That means they're consciously trying to make you laugh, but that doesn't mean they're acting or performing a specific role. Tracy Morgan, at all times, is Tracy Jordan--and because of that, he's become one of the least predictable--and most blisteringly excellent--performance artists since Andy Kaufman.

Although the writers of 30 Rock use him keenly, Tracy's shtick is really honed for talk show appearances. It's his clash with the phoniness of television's "non-fiction" that works so well. Check out this morning show appearance in El Paso:

And this two part clip from Kimmel's show:

As you can probably tell by now, dude can deliver a line. What inflection! Listen to him deliver the closing line in the ESPN commercial:

"The way I dunk on you is going to look unorthodox." Come again?

What Kaufman had over Tracy is an assemblage of personae. Right now, Tracy's only got one, and good as it is, it might not be able to sustain him that much longer. Gallagher only had one note, and although watermelon smashing had surprisingly long legs, where is he now? Tracy needs a second act. I hope he's developing it. In the meantime, it's probably best to watch this again: